Becoming Elena Gilbert
by Ichigo2491
Summary: Elena is a vampire now, and her whole world has changed. She struggles with her craving for blood, her heightened emotions and senses, and her feelings for the Salvatore brothers. Most of all, she is trying to remain true to herself. But how can she do that when she doesn't even know who she is? DE. (CHAPTER TWO IS UP)
1. Mistake

**I don't always write TVD fanfic, but when I do, it's Delena. Be warned: Contains small spoilers for season four, (minor) Stefan bashing and hints of Steferine. Also contains underage drinking, but if y'all cared about that, I doubt you could watch this show in the first place. Tee hee. Now commence to chapter one! **

* * *

**Becoming Elena Gilbert **

The bunny diet was just not cutting it, and Stefan's melancholy looks were getting on her last frayed nerve. So Elena Gilbert, baby vampire, was taking a page out of the Damon Salvatore playbook. She was getting wasted in Mystic Grill on a Saturday afternoon.

It was an odd hour, not quite lunch and not quite dinner, so the place was peaceful and almost empty. The interior of the grill was dimly lit, illuminated only by thin beams of muted sunlight hitting the carpet and the gleaming wood of the bar. This suited Elena just fine. Ever since she completed the transition, she'd been in sensory overload. Everything was so much more vivid when you were a vampire, and it was terrifying, even painful. The sun was even brighter than it had been when she was human. Her ears were constantly buzzing with noises she used to be able to tune out. She saw colors she never could have imagined and detail that she could never have guessed had been there all the time. It was better here, in this cool dark quiet place. She could focus better, her near-constant headache dying down to a dull thud in her temples.

"Another Jack and Coke, Elena?" Matt asked from across the bar. "Or have you reached your limit?" His blue eyes glinted with mischief but also caution.

"Please," Elena snorted. "I'm just getting started." She pushed the empty glass towards him, and Matt took it in hand and started mixing her next drink. He did it quite nonchalantly, because it didn't matter who saw. No one was watching, and even if they had been, Elena could have compelled them into forgetting that she wasn't actually twenty-one.

She wished that she could compel herself to forget that she would never be twenty-one.

Another painful throb in her head made her flinch. She pressed a shaking hand to her forehead and leaned on the bar, gritting her teeth. The country station on the radio was turned down to a low hum, but Elena could hear every word with stunning clarity. In the kitchen, forks clinked as they were washed. Water roared out of a bathroom sink. Someone dropped a plate, and the resultant crash made Elena shudder.

"You okay?" Matt asked her, sliding the drink across the bar into her waiting hands.

Elena raised her eyes to his, her eyebrows elevated in an expression of innocence. "I'm fine," she said, with a small smile. Matt returned the smile and went back to polishing glasses and bottles. Elena took a long sip of the Jack and Coke. Around the glass, her hands shook constantly.

Being a vampire was supposed to make you freakishly strong, but so far Elena had only felt weak, even sick. When she looked at herself in the mirror she saw a gaunt, pale girl. That might have been what vampires in the books were like, but having been up-close and personal with an assortment of vampires had told Elena that in real life, they looked like people. They looked just like they had when they were alive. She didn't. She looked ill. And she felt even worse.

The hunger never left her, no matter how many squirrels and rabbits she drained. And Stefan was always there, trying so hard, being so gentle and sensitive and cautious.

The problem was that Elena didn't _want _gentle and sensitive and cautious, not right now. Stefan was trying to make her feel better, but instead whenever she was around him, every time he praised her, every time he handed her some inspirational quotation or a Lexi anecdote, it made her feel even worse. Sometimes it even made her angry, though she never said a word about what she was really feeling. She wanted them to be Stefan and Elena again, to have things sweet and tender and almost easy, like they'd been before. But that wasn't happening. And she was starting to realize, sickeningly, that it was never going to be the same between them again. Stefan didn't look at her the same way. He was always sad, always worried. She couldn't remember the last time he'd smiled at her with real warmth. As for Damon, he hovered on the edges. He smiled, but bitterly. He barely spoke, and when he did, it was either one bland word to her or a venomously sarcastic remark to Stefan. There were no jokes. Not even any fights. She longed for those fights.

Bad enough that she was a vampire… she didn't want to be _treated_ like one.

Matt had moved off down the bar to refill a couple of the beer taps, but now he was back and talking. Elena had to force herself to concentrate on what he was saying, because there was a fly whining in the corner of the room and it was very distracting.

"Did Caroline tell you what happened in English yesterday? With the sub?" Matt said, vigorously wiping down shot glasses as he talked.

"No, what happened?" Elena asked automatically.

"It was funny as hell! Let me start at the beginning…" Matt launched enthusiastically into the story of the prank the class had pulled on the substitute teacher. It really was funny, and Elena's laughter was genuine, but more than the story itself, she was happy because it was being told. Matt was talking to her about school, Matt was proving that with all they'd been through they could still appreciate juvenile humor. Matt was proving that there was still something worth smiling about. Most importantly, Matt was treating her the way he always had. She washed his words down with a sip of whiskey.

_God bless Matt Donovan. _

"So then, Care was all like… aw, shit!" Matt had dropped a glass, and it had shattered. The noise splintered Elena's concentration and set her head throbbing again. A piece of flying glass had nicked Matt's hand, and the jagged line of blood was so bright against his fair skin.

So bright.

He was saying something, but Elena couldn't hear him. All she could hear was the thudding of his heart. The crashing roar of his blood. He was pressing the washcloth over the wound, but the scent of his blood, hot and metallic and sharply sweet, hovering in the air. Drifted into Elena's nostrils. Settled in her open mouth. Her stomach twisted and ached; she was suddenly starving to death. Her jaw began to ache as her fangs struggled free. She watched from somewhere outside herself as Matt's expression of worry shifted into one of fear. He was saying more things, but they didn't matter. She wasn't going to kill him. How could she? He was her friend. But she was so so hungry, and he smelled so good. Surely Matt wouldn't mind if she just drank a little.

After all, he owed her.

One moment was all it would have taken. In an instant, she could have been over the bar. She could have pulled Matt into her arms and locked her jaws around his neck and sucked his delicious blood into her mouth, savoring every drop. She could have. She would have.

But instead she felt hand closing, gently and firmly, around her wrist, locking her in place. She felt an arm encircle her waist and somebody much stronger than she was leading her away with no effort at all, and through the haze that had overtaken her senses she heard him say coolly, "Don't worry, quarterback. I've got this."

"Dammit, Damon," she snarled, trying to twist free. "Let me go! I'm hungry!" How dare he take her away? She wanted blood, and she wanted it now!

"Oh, I get that," said Damon, his tone simultaneously patient and mocking. He was leading her out of the grill and into the blazing sunlight, glaring down from the sky and leaping up from the pavement. Momentarily overwhelmed, Elena closed her eyes and stopped struggling and allowed Damon to lead her blind to his car. Then his hands were on her shoulders, steadying her, and the next thing she saw was his eyes, staring down into hers intensely. They were so blue.

"Breathe, Elena," he urged. "Breathe and focus."

It was tone, more than his words, that brought her back to her senses. He sounded steady and sure, like he truly expected her to get her shit together. Like he would expect nothing less.

He didn't sound like this was the end of the world.

The world shifted. She came back into herself, and she was weak, hungry and horrified.

"Oh my God," she whispered. "I almost… I almost tried to kill Matt…"

"Yeah, but you didn't," said Damon calmly.

"Only because you stopped me."

"You could have fought me," Damon pointed out, rolling his eyes as though this was oh-so-obvious. "You could have tried harder to get away, but you didn't. And you didn't drain your ex-boyfriend. So, congratulations. Have a drink on me."

He produced from his jacket pocket a pouch of O-Negative and tossed it to her as casually as if it were a Coke can. She caught it in her trembling hands and looked at Damon, fearfully. She was scared. She was scared to drink it because if she liked it… God, if she liked it, could she ever stop? Images of Stefan's face, contorted with bloodlust, welled up from her memories and paralyzed her. She didn't ever want that to happen to her. She knew it worried Stefan too. That was why he had her sticking to forest animals. That was why he watched her every move and flinched whenever her fangs came out.

But Damon obviously thought she could handle it, or he wouldn't have given her the blood. And she trusted Damon.

And she was so hungry. So hungry.

Damon kept his eyes fixed on hers. He seemed to know exactly what she needed him to say. "It's okay, Elena. I won't tell Stefan." There was a slight bitter edge to his voice, but she knew it wasn't directed at her. And she was so tired of feeling like a walking corpse.

Elena ripped into the pouch and savored the blood.

She couldn't remember the taste of Jeremy's blood, which she'd taken a few drops of in order to complete the transition. She'd been in such a daze, and she didn't really want to remember drinking her brother's blood, so she tried not to think about it. She used to imagine what blood must taste like to vampires, before she became one. She didn't see how it was possible for them to enjoy the metallic taste of it. She figured they must taste it like wine or spaghetti sauce or a V8. But of course it wasn't like that at all.

It was so much better.

It was incomparable to any other thing. It was indescribably in human terms. It was rich and full and tingling and electric and bursting with vibrancy, with warmth, and it tasted of _life_. It slipped past her lips and trickled onto her tongue and down her throat. It filled up her senses and it quenched her raging hunger and it made her feel _alive again. _Under Damon's watchful gaze, she drank it in like she used to take in oxygen.

When the pouch was empty, she licked the residue of the blood off her teeth. She expected to want more, to plead for more. But she didn't. She wasn't hungry, she wasn't sick. She was satisfied.

She hadn't felt this much like herself in a very long time. She didn't feel human, but she did feel alive. And she felt like Elena Gilbert.

Damon was smiling. "So tell me, warrior princess. How does that compare with the veggie lifestyle?"

"I've always hated tofu," Elena joked.

Damon's smile widened to genuine amusement, but he didn't say anything. He just looked at her. Mischievously. Fondly. Proudly. Admiringly.

Lovingly.

Just as he always had.

Elena imagined that her heart was beating faster, even though she knew that wasn't possible. She could almost feel the thud against her ribcage. The body remembers even what the mind no longer does. She could still feel the butterflies fluttering their wings against the inside of her stomach. Her skin still prickled with awareness as she gazed into those beautiful eyes. They were so much more arresting now, she thought, now that she could see the golden flakes in them, like sunlight dappling the ocean's shallows.

_You should say something now, _her mind prompted.

She opened her mouth. "Thank you, Damon," she whispered.

He nodded. "Anytime."

_You should say something else. _

"Really, I don't know how to thank you enough. I don't know what I'd do without you." Elena was embarrassed the moment she finished, but oddly she didn't regret the words. They were true and it felt good to say them and he deserved to hear them. And to her surprise, she found that there was more to say. Was this what Elena Gilbert would do? It must be, because it's what Elena Gilbert was _doing._

Damon looked surprised. "It was no big deal," he said.

"No, it's a huge deal!" Elena exclaimed. "Don't downplay yourself, Damon, not this time. You saved me from hurting one of my best friends. You were there for me when I needed someone most. You knew exactly what to do and exactly what to say. You were the first person to tell me it was okay to drink the blood. You were the only one who trusted me to drink it. I couldn't even trust myself unless you had shown me first that you thought I could do it."

"I _knew _you could do it," he said.

Her eyes watered, but she knew she had to get through this. "Exactly, Damon. But _I_ didn't know. I was too scared to drink blood in front of Stefan. I wanted to, so badly, but I was afraid of disappointing him. I never wanted him to see the worst of me." Her voice shook. She was confessing things to Damon that she hadn't even admitted to herself.

"But you don't mind showing the worst of yourself to me," he said bitterly.

"That's not the point," she cried. "I was afraid he would stop loving me."

There was a long silence. When Damon spoke, he sounded pained. "Elena, Stefan would never stop loving you."

"We both know that's not true," said Elena. "In fact, I'm not sure he ever did. Not truly. For Stefan, it's always going to be Katherine. Now that I'm a vampire, there's nothing to separate me from her in his eyes. " A tear slipped down her cheek.

Damon opened his mouth to argue with her, then closed it.

Elena knew that she had to say these things. It hurt her to admit them and it was going to hurt worse, but it had to be done. The words poured out of her like water. There was no stopping them. She didn't even want to try anymore.

"I never gave you enough credit. This not-killing-people thing… it's hard. It's harder than I ever imagined it would be, and I almost killed Matt today, and I know that I'm going to make other mistakes. I know that I need your help if I'm going to make it through this and gain half the control that you have."

"Elena," Damon said quietly. "Of course I'll help you."

"I'm not finished."

He shut his mouth, and watched her closely. There was a crow in the tree at the edge of the parking lot, and it gave a soft croak that both of them heard.

"Through everything, you've always been there for me," Elena said. "And I just… I can't believe how stupid I've been. Not to say this sooner…"

"Say what, Elena?" Damon's voice had gone somewhat hoarse. The air around them both had gone still. The hum of the insects in the background was a muted music.

Elena's eyes peered into Damon's as if for dear life. Her voice was clear and bold and strong. "I love you, Damon."

The crow took to the air in a burst of black feathers, leaving the tree branch trembling in his wake.

Damon looked away. He looked upset. Angry.

"Please say something," Elena whispered. "What, don't you believe me?"

"No," Damon said finally. "No, Elena. Sorry, I don't believe you." His voice was hard and cold. "It's kind of hard to be thrilled about you realizing your love for me right after my brother starts falling out of love with you. Awfully convenient, don't you think?"

He was hurt. Elena felt cold. She'd made a terrible mistake. "Damon, please, that's not what I meant!"

"It is what it is, Elena," Damon answered. "I'm tired of being jerked around." He did sound tired, exhausted. He put his hands in his pockets like a dejected high-schooler. "I've had enough."

"What do you think I'm trying to say?" Elena shouted. "I'm trying to say I'm not going to jerk you around anymore! I want to be with you, why won't you accept that?"

He rounded on her, his eyes flashing. He was yelling now too. "Because, Elena! Because you don't know how to be alone. You don't know how to make a choice and stick to it. You tell everyone you don't know what you want, and now you tell me you want me? How am I supposed to trust you?"

Elena opened her mouth to give him a good answer. Then she realized she couldn't. She just stared at him, her heart breaking inside her chest, tears coming silently down her cheeks.

"Sorry," Damon said, softly and bitterly. "I want to believe you, Elena. You have no idea how much I want to believe you. But I can't."

Then he turned and walked away, leaving Elena in the parking lot of the Mystic Grill, alone and hungry for something that wasn't blood.

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**Hopefully I'll have chapter two up in the next couple of days. I'm sorry if there was any incoherent rambling in this chapter, I'm super-sick and might have gotten a little delirious. I would definitely appreciate any critique I can use to make this story better! **

**Reviews = awesome **


	2. Gap Year

**Hey hey hey! Who's excited about the season premiere? I know I am! I know that this story will pretty much become irrelevant after the episode airs, but I hope you lovely people will bear with it for one more chapter... which I believe is all that will take to wrap this up. **

**It's a longer chapter this time around. ****Thanks so much for y'alls valuable advice last time! I appreciate it so much :D And now, on to chapter two!**

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**Chapter Two: Gap Year **

For several moments after Damon had vanished, Elena stood frozen in the parking lot. Her body, so alive a few moments ago, had stilled to the point she thought she might never be able to move it again.

_He didn't even take his car, _she thought distantly, her unfocused eyes resting on the gleaming blue paint, dazzling beneath the afternoon sun. For some reason the sight of the vehicle, still and empty and alone in its parking space, made her feel ridiculously small and sad.

She felt as though the ground had been ripped out from underneath her. Somehow, through all the bad times, through every change, through every loss that should have ripped her apart, Damon had become the one sure thing, the one person she knew she could never lose. The one person she knew would always be behind her, waiting to catch her should she fall. The one safe place to land, the one keeping her whole when she easily could have crumbled into tiny pieces. She'd come to count on him like she counted on air. Of course, she didn't have to breathe anymore. But it was a hard habit to break.

She hadn't feared losing his love, because she'd believed it impossible. And she had never anticipated that it would hurt this badly when she did. It was like her insides were on the outside.

_Don't be stupid, Elena, _she told herself savagely, jerking herself out of her stupor. Her vision snapped back into focus. _Of course he still loves you. He's not that fickle. You couldn't have upset him that much if he didn't love you. _

The thought was far from comforting. She regretted ever speaking up now. She should have left it at thank-you. The blood had made her feel like she could do anything, say anything. So she had, but she hadn't stopped to think about the one who was listening.

The look on Damon's face had been mingled anger and agony. All raw, all real, all her fault. It made tears well in her eyes. She'd hurt him, and for the first time she realized that it was impossible to hurt him without rending her own heart in the process. They were too tightly bound.

"I really do love you," she whispered to the empty parking lot. "I really do."

Her words hung in the air like a haze.

It wasn't herself she would have to convince. It was Damon.

She hadn't made anything easy for him. Why should he make this easy for her?

In the afternoon heat, she shuddered.

* * *

Damon didn't go home.

The Salvatore boarding house was the last place he wanted to be. It had only just started to feel like home, before Klaus came along and fucked everything up. Fucked Stefan up. Now, it was haunted by a myriad of ghosts. Sometimes it felt like they were hiding in the dark hallways. Watching. Whispering.

Rose. Andie.

Ric.

Because he couldn't drive, Damon ran. And because he hadn't been able to dodge the thought of Alaric, he went to a small house on the outskirts of town. A house he'd only recently been invited into, by the only friend he still had left.

Meredith looked up from her book as Damon appeared in her kitchen. She was dressed simply; jeans and a tee shirt. It was her day off. One hand rested on a heavy crossbow on the kitchen table.

"You have got to stop doing that," she scolded. "I might end up shooting you one of these days."

"That would require you actually being able to hit me," Damon mocked casually, claiming the other chair.

Meredith glared at him and pushed back from her chair. "The usual, I presume?"

Damon rubbed a hand across his face as if to clear his vision. "Make it a double."

Meredith nodded. She didn't ask any questions, just went straight to the liquor cabinet and started filling a tumbler of bourbon.

"Bad day, I assume?" she asked, coming back to the table and sliding the drink across to him.

Damon reached for her book and flipped it over. "Catcher in the Rye? Really? You know, if you're into adolescent whining, I can get Jeremy Gilbert over here to tell you his life story. He'd give Holden Caufield a run for his money in the angst department."

From her patient silence, Damon knew that Meredith wasn't going to take the bait. He'd made friends with her against his own will, and hers too. It had happened fast, and it had happened fully and simply and easily. She knew he was hiding something, and she wasn't going to cooperate with his deflection methods.

"You'll never guess what happened at the hospital yesterday," Meredith began in a measured tone. "This old man, Mr. Jenkins, was telling us about his grandchildren..." Meredith proceeded to launch into the most mind-numbing anecdote Damon had ever heard... and he'd heard a lot.

He drained the tumbler in a matter of seconds. It was going to take more alcohol than that to get him to open up about that mess in the parking lot.

Two glasses later, Damon couldn't take it anymore and interrupted Meredith's delightful story of the contents of a patient's bedpan in order to start spilling his own guts. How he'd left the boarding house soon after an anxious Stefan let it slip that he hadn't heard from Elena in a couple of hours. How he'd started driving, not with any particular destination in mind. How he'd decided, on a whim, to stop at the Mystic Grill, and how he'd arrived just in time to stop sweet Elena Gilbert from chowing down on her ex-boyfriend's jugular vein. He did not fail to mention that she showed remarkable restraint for a baby vampire who was clearly wasting away before everyone's eyes.

He described how the blood had healed her; how her cheeks looked fuller, her skin shinier, her eyes regaining a trace of the sparkle that took his breath away (though he didn't actually Meredith that little factoid).

And then, reluctantly but knowing that he couldn't stop now, and so goddam tired of keeping everything to himself, Damon told Meredith about Elena's clumsy confession of love.

"She said she loves me," Damon said in a flat tone. "That she wants to be with me."

"But isn't that a good thing? For you, anyway? Isn't that what you've been waiting for?" Meredith asked as she poured more whiskey. This time, she poured some for herself too.

"She doesn't mean it," Damon muttered. "And I don't want her wasting her eternity on me. Not unless she's really sure."

"Maybe you should give her some credit. Assume she knows her own mind."

Damon laughed bitterly. "If you knew her a little better, you wouldn't be saying that. Elena likes to convince herself that she doesn't know what she wants."

"Maybe she really does this time," Meredith said encouragingly.

Slowly, Damon shook his head. "She's been through a lot. She said things she didn't mean. I was there when she needed someone and now she thinks she needs me." His voice was grim, resigned.

"She probably _does_ need you. She needs all the friends she can get," Meredith said pointedly.

"Yeah, and she's always going to need Stefan in her life too," Damon went on bleakly. "It's always going to be Stefan."

Meredith leveled a searching gaze at him. "Could you deal with that?"

Damon took a long drink from his glass so he didn't have to answer. Elena and Stefan were the two people he loved most in the world. To keep them both in his life, he'd do anything.

But it was impossible.

* * *

Eventually, of course, Elena had to leave the parking lot. On her way home, she took out her cell phone, intending to call Matt and apologize. In her mind she fumbled with the words. _Sorry for trying to eat you earlier. Your blood just smelled really delicious! No hard feelings? _

It was her first such apology, and she sure as hell hoped it would be her last.

"Hello?" Matt's voice was cautious. Elena could hear the bar noises, muffled through the phone speaker, in the background.

"Matt," Elena said quietly. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Are _you_ okay?"

"Yeah... Damon brought me some blood. I feel a lot better now."

"That's good."

There was a long and uncomfortable silence, punctuated in the background by a Willie Nelson tune and the clinking of glasses.

"Matt, I'm so, so sorry," Elena began. "I didn't mean to... I would never..."

"Hey, hey, hey," Matt interrupted. "It's fine, Elena. It really is. I understand."

She stopped right there in the middle of the sidewalk, gaping in disbelief. "Matt, are you ... are you serious? I could have killed you!"

"But you didn't," Matt said, with an eerie echo of Damon in his voice. "And that's all that matters."

"Are you sure?"

"Elena, we're cool. I promise. See you at school tomorrow?" There was once more an easy friendliness in his voice.

Relief rushed over Elena like a wave and brought a few tears to her eyes along with it. "Sure. See you tomorrow."

As she hung up the phone, Elena felt the knot in her chest loosen just a little bit. If Matt could forgive her for trying to kill him, surely Damon could forgive her for breaking his heart... right?

That remained to be seen, but one thing was certain. She had to tell Stefan, and she was not looking forward to it.

* * *

The moment Elena walked through the door of the boarding house, she was hit with the oppressive atmosphere that permeated from the heavy wooden walls. This house, with its big, mysterious, ornately decorated things, used to be one of her favorite places. But lately she felt felt confused here, small and frightened and suffocated. And yet she kept coming back, because she craved the coolness, the dimness... and the brothers.

Stefan was in the living room, making a pretense of writing in his journal, but every line in his body was poised and waiting for her. He dropped his journal and headed toward her with wide hazel eyes that did not do a very good job of hiding his fear. As he rushed to her and pulled her into a gentle embrace, Elena sighed and relaxed against him. Some things would never change. Stefan would always worry about her, he would always be there with open arms. And she loved him for that. She loved him for loving her.

But some things had to change, and this no longer felt right.

Stefan's body went tense against hers and he pulled back abruptly, dropped his hands from her shoulders, studied her face with a look of dawning comprehension and horror.

"Oh, Elena," he whispered.

It took her a second to realize what Stefan was talking about. He had smelled the human blood on her mouth. He had seen the guilty look on her face. And he had jumped to the logical conclusion: Elena had killed someone.

He had every reason to suspect that. She very easily could have killed someone today... one of her dearest friends. But she hadn't. And Stefan's reaction, the look on his face... the horror, the shock, the shame...

It hurt her. And where Elena Gilbert, human, could have shrugged off the flickers of irritation, buried them and faked a smile, Elena Gilbert, vampire, was pissed off.

"Don't look at me like that, Stefan Salvatore," she said stiffly, her hands clenched at her sides. "For your information, I didn't kill or even hurt anyone."

Stefan looked as though she'd slapped him. "Elena, I didn't..."

"Oh, yes you did! Now are you going to let me explain myself?"

He nodded slowly, looking ashamed.

Elena briefly related the days events. She held nothing back, except her confession of love to Damon. She was saving that for later. Still, by the pained flicker in Stefan's eyes when Damon's name came up, she could tell that he suspected what she was keeping close to her heart. When she finished, Stefan's face had lost none of its conflict. He looked haunted, utterly bereft. He looked at her like she was a stranger he had no desire to know better. She had dared to hope that he would understand, that he would tell her everything was okay and he was glad she was feeling better. But there was the gulf between them, yawning open like a fresh wound. And Elena, tired of being hurt, simply snapped.

"Stop it, Stefan!" Elena shouted, hardly recognizing the sound of her own voice. "Could you for one second stop looking so damn tragic? You have no right to judge me! How dare you look at me like I've done something wrong? How dare you be disgusted by me drinking human blood?" Her voice broke as she stared him down, trembling with hurt.

"Elena," Stefan choked, his eyes swimming with tears. "I'm sorry. I'm not upset with you. I'm not disgusted with you. I'm not ashamed of you." He drew a shuddering breath and continued, his voice quivering with emotion. "I hate myself for letting this happen to you. I'm disgusted with myself for not being able to save you, and I'm ashamed of myself for not being able to take care of you properly now. It kills me to see you suffering, and knowing that there's nothing I can do for you, because everything I do just ends up getting you hurt worse and worse. Elena, I'm sorry..." Stefan slumped back onto the sofa, put his face in his hands.

All the anger drained out of Elena, leaving her feeling like a punctured balloon. She kept forgetting that nothing was simple. That everyone was hurting. She sat down beside him, and put her hand on his shaking back.

"I can't do this anymore," she said softly.

Stefan lifted his face from his hands and looked up at her. "Yes, you can, Elena. You're the strongest person I..."

"I mean I can't do _this_," Elena said, her eyes stinging slightly with the tears she knew she wouldn't be able to avoid. "The bunnies. The sad eyes. The fights we aren't having because we don't trust each other. The tiptoeing around each other because we don't know who we are anymore. And maybe we never did. Stefan, you mean so much to me and I will always love you, but this is killing us. It's killing me. Everything you've done for me... it means more than you know, and the last thing I would ever want to do is hurt you... but I've got to learn how to stand on my own. It's like... I've always been one of a pair. I know how to be alone, how to be myself, just myself. I don't know how to just be _me_."

She bit her lip, knowing how deeply she had hurt him, but also knowing it had to be done, and she wasn't going to take it back.

Stefan just nodded slowly, his teary eyes never leaving her face. "I ... I understand. If that's what you really want."

Elena was startled to realize that it was exactly what she wanted.

* * *

When Damon got back to the boarding house, it was dark. The stars were out, sparkling in the blue velvet of the sky. When Damon opened the door and stepped inside, all he could smell was blood.

He found his brother in the basement. The cooler was hanging wide open, the lid resting on bent, twisted hinges. The floor was wildly flecked with red. A strewn path of empty, tattered blood bags led him to Stefan, who was passed out in a corner, his mouth and hands stained with Type O Positive.

Damon took in the sight with a long look. Just when he had thought his day couldn't get any shittier, Saint Stefan the Sanguine decided to fall off the wagon and go on a blood bender.

There was no point in letting him lie there. Damon bent down and pulled Stefan off the floor, throwing his little brother over his shoulder in a fireman's carry and heading upstairs, making a conscious effort not to drip any blood on the rugs or the varnished floors.

He dumped Stefan's prone form in the bathtub and started the flow of ice cold water. As the frigid water rose around him, Stefan's eyes gradually opened. They were bloodshot and wild and searched out Damon with a vengeful glare.

"Miss me, Stef?" Damon asked sarcastically. "Looks like someone had a little too much fun tonight."

Stefan slumped into the tub, the water turning a rusty orange shade around him as it leeched the blood from his clothing and hands. He turned his face away from his brother.

"Can I ask what's driven my baby brother to drink?" said Damon sweetly.

Stefan laughed bitterly. "Who do you think?"

For a second Damon was caught off guard. "Elena was here?"

Stefan rolled his eyes and slid deeper in the bathtub. His usually sculpted hair had fallen, and the ends of it danced gracelessly beneath the surface of the bloody water. "Congratulations, brother," he said bitterly. "You win." Then he closed his eyes and fell back into unconsciousness.

Damon had no words. His mind was churning as he emptied the tub. He refilled it with warm water, saw to it that Stefan was rinsed clean. Then he dragged his brother out, toweled him off, threw a robe on him, and actually tucked him into bed, all without the blood addict regaining consciousness. Stefan looked young and not at all dangerous beneath the blankets.

As he closed his brother's bedroom door, Damon was torn. There wasn't much that would drive Stefan to deliberately drink human blood, to cut himself off from the tortured and brooding persona that he seemed to think was keeping him human. What had Elena done?

There was only one thing she _could_ have done. She'd broken Stefan's heart.

Damon went to the drawing room and poured some bourbon. The buzz he'd picked up at Meredith's had already dissipated - damn high vampire tolerance - and he needed a drink.

Elena had called it quits with Stefan. Finally, definitely? No, probably not. She'd take it back. They'd work things out, like they always did, and Damon would force a smile and be there when they did.

Damn, hadn't he dreamed of these moments? Hadn't he imagined them, played them out in his head like sweet fantasies over and over again? Elena telling him she loved him, Elena telling Stefan it was over? Now both of these things had happened in one day, and all Damon felt was miserable.

She didn't know what she was doing. She was making a mistake. And nothing was going to change.

But if there wasn't any hope, then why was he still hoping?

* * *

"So... if you and Stefan are over, does that mean you and Damon are..." Jeremy trailed off in a confused and awkward silence, his cheeks turning faintly red. Elena could tell just by looking at her brother that he was flashing back to the motel in Colorado.

"No," she said, meeting Jeremy's eyes squarely from across the kitchen table. "No, we're not together."

Jeremy returned her gaze, and his sharpened. "But you want to be."

She nodded. "Not now, though. I'm not ready. I've decided to take a gap year."

Jeremy looked at her and then started snickering. "A gap year? From dating?"

Elena grinned in spite of herself. "Dating and college."

Jeremy laughed. "Well, that sounds good to me. If it's what you want."

"Yes," said Elena. "It's what I want." She took her mug of tea - hoping that she would be able to keep it down now that she'd had some human blood - and got up. At the very least, she could savor the smell of the tea. It was mint and honey and a dozen other minute flavors that could only be detected by vampire senses. "I'm going to bed. Will you get the lights before you come up?"

"Yeah, yeah," said Jeremy. "Just got to finish this homework first.

"Night, Jer!" Elena called from the stairs.

"Night!"

In her room, Elena surveyed herself in the mirror. She was still a shade or so paler than she liked to be. Her hair had lost some body, but there was shampoo that could help that. She looked a bit like herself, just thinner, more tired. And her eyes were a little puffy, because she'd been crying. Crying over a breakup, but not like it was the end of the world. Things had to change. That didn't mean they had to end.

She opened a dresser door looking for some comfy pajamas, and found an old friend. She hadn't written in her diary for weeks. Things had gotten too complicated, and on the few occasions she had opened the book hoping for some comfort, the blank pages had taunted her. Tonight, though, she pulled the book out took it to her bed. She picked up a pen and flipped to a clean page.

_Dear Diary... _

* * *

**I hope everyone made it through that okay... I hope I wasn't too harsh on Stefan :( I wasn't trying to be! **

**One more chapter should do it. And remember, reviews are golden, constructive reviews are platinum. Everyone enjoy the premiere! :D **


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